I think 2019 was the year I finally grew up. I think maturity came even when it was unwanted. As I look back over the year I see where I really grew a lot and where I struggled. I can’t believe that in a matter of 12 months I have started my own business, changed […]
One of the projects that has been taking up some of my extra time these days is a dream project involving creating a Heritage Apple Orchard at the 1870’s Adaland Mansion in Barbour County, West Virginia. I actually started work on this project last spring during the Covid shut down. Volunteers came together to apply […]
In this blog you will find stories about my family, our adventures traveling the state we call home, our love of cooking, canning and raising children.I write about West Virginia history, culture, the arts and their traditions. I share things about the work I do working with Non-Profit organizations, who battle everyday to make my […]
Today marks one year to the day that I lost my mother, Veda Maxine Lowrey, June 20th 2019. It has been a turbulent year not just because I faced a future without her, but because of all the changes that have happened in the world. I can’t remember a year in my life that has […]
I get asked all the time if where I work, The Golden Rule, is haunted? For a building to be built in 1902 and not be haunted is a surprise. I would say that the building is not haunted in the traditional way. Not in the way horror movies show hauntings, full of evil spirits […]
In this blog you will find stories about my family, our adventures traveling the state we call home, our love of cooking, canning and raising children.I write about West Virginia history, culture, the arts and their traditions. I share things about the work I do working with Non-Profit organizations, who battle everyday to make my […]
The history of the Barn Quilt or Barn Paintings in Appalachia can be traced back over 220 hundred years. If we consider Hex Sign painting, Under Ground Rail Road Quilts and Barn Quilts all as part of the larger history of using large symbolistic language in folk art. So if this is true then I […]
Abandoned homes or towns are my favorite places to visit. So when my husband offered to drive Christopher and I to a historic abandoned coal mining town near where he was working I got super excited!!We spent one early morning exploring the New River Gorge Valley and the lost town of Nuttallburg WV. For a […]
In this blog you will find stories about my family, our adventures traveling the state we call home, our love of cooking, canning and raising children.I write about West Virginia history, culture, the arts and their traditions. I share things about the work I do working with Non-Profit organizations, who battle everyday to make my […]
In this blog you will find stories about my family, our adventures traveling the state we call home, our love of cooking, canning and raising children.I write about West Virginia history, culture, the arts and their traditions. I share things about the work I do working with Non-Profit organizations, who battle everyday to make my […]
As of Valentine’s day of 2020, I finished up my 7th year of blogging. It has been a wonderful journey, I had no idea I would still be here writing. I hope this post helps me refocus my need to write and share about West Virginia. This blog was created because of my personal disappointment […]
Katrina Smith-Johnson at Walmart with Mask April 2020 So do you remember when The Hunger Games came out in theaters and everyone was impressed with its colorful images of the future? The bold hair colors and clothes that were on fire but didn’t burn you. The different districts that were so very strange and unique. […]
Many of us West Virginia Mountaineers shared in a joke or two this last week about why our state was the last to have the Coronavirus reported in our state. But many of us wonder about the underlying truth about why we are just now seeing reported cases. I suspect that we are behind in […]
In this blog you will find stories about my family, our adventures traveling the state we call home, our love of cooking, canning and raising children.I write about West Virginia history, culture, the arts and their traditions. I share things about the work I do working with Non-Profit organizations, who battle everyday to make my […]
